From No Tomorrow

No Tomorrow

The next three weeks were a blur for Elzbieta. Frantically, she pushed for an attack on the Imperial time machine, but the commanders delayed it, unwilling have their fliers away when the Ares attacked. When Elzbieta tried to argue further, they would simply shut her down and promise a raid after their encounter with the airship.

Imre and the rest of the mechanics worked tirelessly at Elzbieta's stolen fighter, which they painted with bright orange symbols on the upper faces of its wings. Along with bullets for their machine guns, which were now in short supply, the planes were armed with unguided rockets. At her request, Elzbieta's stolen fighter was equipped with air-to-surface bombs.

Once all of the hardware was prepared, the Ragyogas waited in silence. When Elzbieta got her journal back, she scribbled in one sentence about her arrival at the Antares, then abandoned it. On the rare occasion in which she needed to talk to someone, she spoke to Imre. All around her, the rest of the Ragyogas looked distant and forlorn. They seemed to have given themselves up for dead or put all of their hope in Elzbieta.

On August 22, Elzbieta and sixteen other fliers waited on the deck in deathly silence, staring blankly east. The day was chilly and grey. An intermittent wind blew in from the northwest, sending waves lapping against the side of the wounded ship.

"There it is," someone pointed out.

Everyone squinted. In the distance, forging its way through the misty skies over the choppy sea, the Ares slowly approached. Floating towards them with ominous tranquility, the construct looked like an enormous beast.

"I guess we should get to our planes," one of the pilots dejectedly mumbled.

"Not yet," arrested István, who was still the squadron leader. "It will be at least ten minutes before it catches up to us. And we need to save fuel."

The fliers sat like statues as the air raid alarm began its mournful wail behind them. Crew members rushed about on the deck, checking and re-checking the fighters' systems, while an audible scream penetrated the walls of the ship.

Elzbieta tried to shut it all out and concentrate on the relaxing sound of the waves, but the people's cries refused to be ignored.

"All pilots to your planes!" bellowed a voice over a loudspeaker, "All pilots to planes! All defensive units, take your positions. Give excess weaponry to able civilians."

Quietly, the pilots all stood up and began for their planes. Some mumbled weak encouragement to themselves, some jogged to their planes and still others dedicated their next flight to loved ones. Elzbieta simply trudged in a mute numbness.

Settling serenely into her seat, Elzbieta sped through her manual system checks and listened as the air traffic controller spouted some additional information about the attack, all of which the pilots had heard before.

"Remember," he finished, "Once you've taken out the ship-to-ship guns, don't engage it. Deal with the fighters while we shoot at it."

"Understood," Elzbieta quietly complied, followed by similar acknowledgments from the rest of the fliers.

"Roger that," replied the traffic controller. "You are cleared for takeoff. Good luck."

One by one, the planes took to the sky. When her plane lifted off, Elzbieta had expected to feel that familiar, airy serenity wash over her. This time, however, nothing happened. Sadly, she wondered if some darker shade of that peace was already upon her.

Once in formation, the planes made for the airship, which now floated close to its quarry. Seeing it, Elzbieta barely restrained a gasp. She had imagined a dirigible, but what she saw resembled a behemoth submarine. A huge, blocky black metal hull, looking more like the body of an ocean liner than any part of an aircraft, comprised the lower part of the Ares. Above the body billowed a gently curved, rusty brown cylinder, which she recognized as the gasbag of the dirigible. From beneath it, six metal truss beams jutted up from the bottom like insect legs. On the end of each of these beams was a propeller, affixed to a sophisticated joint and facing upward, providing the metal leviathan with additional lift. A plethora of gun turrets of every size bristled on the surface of the gasbag, swaying like tendrils. Searchlights also studded the craft's exterior, casting thin, probing cones of light toward its target and shifting them around abruptly, searching for the Antares' weaknesses.